Dominant distribution business to the direct market of comic and hobby shops Diamond Comic Distributors Inc. has announced nominees for its Gem Awards through a few sites out there, which makes me think it went out in an e-mail I wasn't privy to, or, even more likely, flat-out missed. The Gem Awards are kind of a "good performance" award. I have no idea how they're compiled, but as I recall retailers vote on the winners. Here are the comics-related nominees by category as pulled out by Stumptown Trade Review and double-checked against Bleeding Cool's story from last week. You can hit that Bleeding Cool link for other hobby-shop related categories.

I think they're kind of fascinating in that you get to see how that company views the comics field generally, and what works from the smaller end of publishing for that company in a way that they can throw a bit of a spotlight on it.